It has been six years since Ring Match Journey, the Nintendo Change health sport that requested gamers to defeat monsters (and an attractive dragon) by way of train. The exercise sport used the Pleasure-Cons’ accelerometers to measure your actions and translate them into health assaults on display screen. It’s bizarre, it’s wacky, however it labored.
I performed fairly a little bit of Ring Match in the course of the COVID-19 lockdown. What can I say: Nintendo saved me energetic at a time after I wasn’t doing a lot else. And it didn’t take lengthy for me to note that I felt stronger. Workout routines like squats or leg lifts, which had been extremely tough in my first week, obtained simpler.
Even now that the world has opened up once more, as a continual miser, I hesitate to hitch a health club or a yoga studio. On the finish of the day, I can’t assist however suppose: We’ve Ring Match at house. (I don’t endorse this mindset, however I do personal it.)
However because the years have passed by, a creeping worry has grown at the back of my thoughts. And now, within the early weeks of the Change 2’s launch, it appears simple: They’re not making a Ring Match 2, are they?
Nintendo ought to make Ring Match 2
Picture: Nintendo
Ring Match Journey was a blockbuster sport for the Nintendo Change. In the course of the pandemic, determined gamers snatched the sport off retailer cabinets or overpaid for it on eBay. In 2022, it was one in every of Nintendo’s best-selling video games.
The identical was true of Wii Match for the Nintendo Wii, which reportedly bought out in shops even earlier than it was launched. However its follow-up, Wii Match U, didn’t achieve this sizzling — it didn’t crack the prime 10 titles for the beleaguered console.
Possibly that is what Nintendo is attempting to keep away from. However the Change 2 isn’t akin to the Wii U with regards to gross sales. There are 3.5 million models within the wild proper now, however scant few console exclusives. I can’t complain that the majority Change video games are playable on the Change 2 (together with the unique Ring Match Journey, extra on that later), however it appears affordable that an viewers for a brand new health sport exists.
A part of the allure of Nintendo’s health video games has all the time been their visible quirks. In some Wii Match workout routines, your bean-shaped Mii is the on-screen avatar, they usually do step workout routines onstage in entrance of cheering crowds. The avatars in Ring Match Journey are extra refined, however the narrative is stuffed with cartoonish characters and eventualities.
The lighthearted aesthetic, and Ring Match Journey’s low-commitment mannequin, make understanding really feel extra enjoyable than a chore. It solely takes about 10 minutes to finish a degree. When you can definitely do extra in a session, I can’t inform you what number of occasions I satisfied myself to get off the sofa and work out as a result of “it’ll solely be 10 minutes!”
Nintendo hasn’t utterly deserted health video games. In December, it launched Health Boxing 3 for the unique Change. As an train sport, it’s undoubtedly useful. However its laser-focus on boxing and a extra simple health club setting doesn’t fairly scratch the itch that Ring Match Journey did.
Theoretically, you’ll be able to play Ring Match Journey endlessly. As soon as the principle quest is over, you’ll be able to basically do a New Sport Plus run by crafting customized exercises. Armen B. at CGI Espresso did a complete yr of Ring Match Journey, and reported that the {hardware} holds up, even after tons of of reps.
It feels incorrect to be asking — nay, begging — Nintendo to let me give them more cash, after they’ve already launched an costly console and populated it with choose $80 exclusives. However even when Ring Match Journey is a endlessly sport, absolutely Nintendo left one thing on the desk?
A second installment of Ring Match’s narrative might carry lapsed gamers like me again to the fold — and introduce new ones to the health sport. Please, my atrophying thigh muscle mass are begging for it!
Ring Match 2 would wish new {hardware}
The excellent news is that Ring Match Journey continues to be suitable with the Nintendo Change 2. However the {hardware} isn’t. In its compatibility information, Nintendo notes that the brand new Pleasure-Cons gained’t match within the Ring-Con or the leg strap. Gamers can nonetheless use the unique Pleasure-Cons to play, which is nice. However given how prone they’re to float, it’s not precisely enjoyable to think about shopping for a complete new console and nonetheless probably needing to shell out for substitute controllers for the outdated one in the event that they break, simply to play a health sport.
It will be nice to see a brand new Ring Match Journey, constructed for the Nintendo Change 2 and its upgraded {hardware}. I’ve all the time appreciated Nintendo’s dedication to health, and I hope we gained’t have to attend too lengthy to see what it might do with the Nintendo Change 2.
